Taking the A+901 this weeek,tips?

EMT760

i'm taking the A+901 exam this week on Thursday. So far I've taken a A+ centric class at my local community college ( Hardware and software) and i'm rewatching all of Professor Messers videos and studying and creating notes. ( have a ton of notes)What software do you think closely resembles the test ?

I have Testout A+ 901 & 902 that I used for school. Do you guys recommend using that? Or should I purchase the Comptia certmaster?Also what types of subjects should I deadicate to memory? I know alot threads I've read suggest port numbers, and sockets, etc?

NetworkingStudent

Measure up offers some good practice tests for the A+.

Also, if you can get your hands on a computer and take it part a few times and put it back together, that may help as well.

codingfanatic

Also check out the apps by Darril Gibson on the Play Store or App Store. I'm using the A+ 220-901 app and it's great so far. There's one for the 902 as well. Good luck!

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EMT760

Thanks, I just downloaded the Darril Gipson one. I was going to try the Certmaster from CompTIA but it seems everyone complains about it( not following objectives, or not detailed enough). Darril Gibson's app looks good so far. Hopefully it mirrors the objectives.

at 7.99 it looks good to me and affordable.

jibtech

I bought the Rxam Cram book for the A+. The test engine that came with it was fantastic for 901. In fact, I am using it now to study for 902.

lanciadelta

I'm taking my cert exam for 901 next week. I have no experience, even though I graduated in CompSci. Long story. I'm studying thru Ed2Go's certification prep course for 901/902. What do you guys think?

EMT760

I passed the exam! I felt the exam was vaugely worded in some areas not giving enough information requiring to critically think, the simulations were pretty basic compared to my Schools Testout PC Pro. Mostly just hardware configuration without booting up into BIOS or OS.

Overall, It wasn't that bad. I found a few things that I feel I wasn't 100% sure about and used the " mark" question feature and came back. I would recommend studying port numbers and IVP4 and IVP6 ip address classes also.


Now onto the 902 portion....

grafix

Are there PBQ's in the exam?I am scheduled to take 901 first week of july.

davec8080

grafix wrote: »

Are there PBQ's in the exam?I am scheduled to take 901 first week of july.

OK, let me state that yes, there are PBQ's in the exam. You will have anywhere from 2 - 6 PBQ's to perform, and that is a GOOD thing. Let me explain...I was first A+ certified about 20 years ago. I'm near the end of my career, but recently accepted a job that requires a A+ "CE" certification. So I tested for 220-901 just THIS MORNING. First time I tested, I aced it. This time around, I scored 780 and I was HAPPY with that score. My thoughts on the test, including the "PBQ's"
First, the test was MUCH harder than I expected. Considering I got a perfect score many years ago, I thought this A+ 901 would be a cake-walk. I was wrong. Before the test, I was using good quality practice tests and never scored below 93%. So that gives you some idea of how to judge when you are ready...you'd better be scoring high 90's on practice tests!!!
While I was studying (Mike Meyers book and Mike Meyers video is my study material), I became aware that there were "PBQ's" on the exam. But I could not find a "free" source to practice "PBQ's". (other than a few free sims that are kinda sorta similar to PBQs on the totalsem web site) I don't like spending too much money on study material. So if I couldn't find good practice PBQ's for free, I had to simply do without.
BEFORE the exam, the thought of the PBQ's made me a little nervous. This was more out of "not knowing" what to expect, than anything else.
AFTER the exam...I say BRING ON THE PBQs!!! PBQs are:
1) FUN!
2) Easier than the multiple choice questions (much!)
3) Count more than the multiple choice questions
Add it all up and, if you get lots of PBQs, you should consider yourself lucky!!!
I only got 2 PBQs on my test today, and I wish I'd have got more. Because I had only 2 PBQ, I had to answer 81 multiple choice questions, and most of those were NOT easy. Other testers report (usually) 3-6 PBQs on their tests. If you get more PBQs, you get significantly fewer multiple choice questions, because CompTIA wants the overall TIME required to pass a single exam to be about equal. I don't know for sure how they calculate it, but best guess is that they probably give you ~4 minutes for a PBQ and 1 minute for each multiple choice question. That seems about right, as the total number of questions (PBQ included) can drop close to 70 if you get more PBQs... and your total test time is 90 minutes. My exam had 83 questions, only two of which were PBQs. So by my best guess, 81 (minutes) plus 2*4 (minutes) and that equals just about 90 minutes...

Anyway, do not worry about the PBQs at all. If you simply read the directions, the PBQs are easier than the multiple choice questions. So study and do practice tests to prepare for a multiple-choice exam, and (you'll see what I mean) the PBQs are intuitive enough that they won't even slow you down...

davec8080

lanciadelta wrote: »

I'm taking my cert exam for 901 next week. I have no experience, even though I graduated in CompSci. Long story. I'm studying thru Ed2Go's certification prep course for 901/902. What do you guys think?

Ed2Go? Definitely over-priced. And 72 hours of video? For A+???? C'mon...
If I read the web site correctly, they have 3 A+ courses, and you'd need all three if that was your only source. But at ~160 bucks a pop? YOUCH.
If Video is your learning style, try lynda at $29 a month. Udemy was also offering similar training at $15 per course (A+ is two courses on Udemy), last I checked. So either way, you'd pay about $30 for QUALITY video training for A+. Is it better or worse than Ed2Go? Who knows? But I passed 220-901 using lynda (Mike Meyers video) as my main source of training. Technically, I got that training free as my free trial at Lynda is not expired yet. If you can pass 901 with 30 bucks or less of training, what would make a different training course worth an extra 400 bucks or so? A passing score is a passing score.

pharius

davec8080 wrote: »

Ed2Go? Definitely over-priced.

Actually a lot of Ed2Go classes are available for free as Gale Courses through public libraries in the United States and Canada.